


The Names We Gain and the Anger We Share

by LadyLade



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Pack Bonding, Pack Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-02
Updated: 2015-09-02
Packaged: 2018-04-18 15:14:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4710590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyLade/pseuds/LadyLade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>By the time Allison’s twenty-four, the other hunters call her The Cleanser. She hunts down a rogue, they say, and it’s like the thing never existed. But there is one thing the hunters don’t know, and that thing is bundled up on the back seat of her car on the long drive home from South Dakota, finally sleeping.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Names We Gain and the Anger We Share

 By the time Allison’s twenty-four, the other hunters call her The Cleanser. She hunts down a rogue, they say, and it’s like the thing never existed. No trace that it was there, no trace that she was there, and certainly no trace that best-in-the-business-archer Allison Argent let an arrow fly straight to the heart of it.

They say that she comes and goes like a heat storm, that she draws power from the earth like a Druid; some say she’s not even human anymore. They say that if an omega a hunter is tracking just suddenly disappears, it’s because Allison Argent got to it first, in that strange six-sense she has for where werewolves will be. No hunter dares to accuse her of this to her face, though, because The Cleanser has taken down entire packs with only the help of her father. Wiped them clean off the earth, they whisper.

Her reputation isn’t hype; Allison has worked hard to get to where she is, and it isn’t false praise that the hunting community gives her. She hunts omegas because they’re most likely to be rogue—the accidentally bitten one, the lone survivor of a pack, the one kicked out of a pack—and because no one misses them when they disappear. She takes down packs when they go power blind like Deucalion, when the power consumes the empathetic part of them. She does not go after innocent packs. All of this the other hunters know.

But there is one thing the hunters don’t know, and that thing is bundled up on the back seat of her car on the long drive home from South Dakota, finally sleeping. Orphaned after his parents (a beta couple) were killed in a car crash, and no pack to turn to, the five year old has been running in the woods for two months. None of the Dakota packs would take him, so he’s coming back to Beacon Hills with her.

“My job is to hunt them,” Allison once told her father, “that doesn’t mean I have to kill them.”

And she has killed some, because some rogues live up to the legends of terror. Allison has nightmares after each kill, that moment of wolf ebbing back into human as they die looping over and over and over again.

But these hunts, where Allison comes back smiling, are the best.

“We aren’t a pet rescue,” Derek says every time, but it’s preferable to the times when Allison comes back grim and alone, and Derek doesn’t say anything at all. Allison is sure he holds back words that would rend her, because he doesn’t trust her to make a righteous kill; but he does trust Stiles, and Stiles always believes in Allison, and that is enough for Derek to keep peace.

This little one, Bradley, snuffling deeper into the blankets, will be a charmer, just like all the other kids she brings back are. Derek’s as reserved around kids as he is adults, but he’s the best at handling them. Scott will adore the boy, and where Scott goes, Isaac follows. And Stiles, well, Stiles will be Stiles.

After almost thirty-five hours, Allison relishes the feel of dirt under her tires as she drives up to the rebuilt Hale house. Derek and Scott are the first out the door, the weirdest Alpha duo the American packs have ever seen. Scott’s smile is splitting across his face as he reaches her, and Allison catches Derek’s eye roll out of the corner of her vision; she laughs into the enthusiastic kiss Scott greets her with.

Stiles and Isaac scuffle to get out of the door first, and as they tussle on the porch the kids of the pack jump over them, all chatter and shrieks of happiness. The adults of the pack follow, and all in all the Beacon Hills pack is just over twenty strong, plus three humans.

“Welcome home,” Scott murmurs in her ear, voice throaty, and even though the others can hear him, it still makes her shiver because it feels like a secret, like something only she and Scott have, cradled between their bodies.

“We aren’t a pet rescue,” Derek says, breaking the moment, but he can’t keep up the serious act when Isaac and Stiles try to tackle him.

“King of the mountain!” one of the girls—Cara, Allison thinks—shouts, and then Derek is barely visible under the swarm of little bodies.

“Fu—sh—get off,” Derek snaps, and of course the kids don’t listen.

“Allison?” Bradley says from behind her, and Allison turns to see him out of the car, slightly scared and unsure and looking smaller than ever.

“Hey, you’re Bradley, right?” Scott crouches down, as good with kids as he is with animals.

Bradley hides behind Allison, but he peeks out and nods at Scott.

“I’m Scott,” he says. “I know we’re pretty loud right now and that there’s a lot of us, but would you like to join our family?”

“You’re a pack, not a family,” Bradley says, something harsh and cornered-animal flitting over his face.

“We are a pack, that’s true,” Scott says, “but why can’t a pack be a family?”

Their conversation is interrupted by Stiles tumbling into Scott, dirt smeared all over the left side of his face.

“Oops,” Stiles mutters, then, “hey, little man!”

“Stiles,” Scott groans, flat on the ground.

Bradley presses his face into Allison’s hip and giggles, quiet but gorgeous.

“They’re dorks, aren’t they?” Allison says, and both Scott and Stiles squawk protests when Bradley nods his agreement.

Then Derek is looming in front of them—Derek still hasn’t been able to drop the aggression from his movements, too ingrained, too synonymous with survival—and pulls Stiles upright by the scruff of his neck.

“Stiles,” Derek grits out, but they all freeze when Bradley creeps out from Allison’s side.

Bradley walks right up to Derek, no fear whatsoever, and they stare at each other for long moments; silent, solemn. Then Bradley raises his arms up, and Derek hoists the boy onto his hip, Bradley clinging to his shirt and hiding his face in Derek’s neck.

Allison and Stiles share a look, because of course, of _course_ , they should have seen the anger in Bradley was the same in Derek, and they may not have lost both parents, but they understand that rage all the same.

Allison registers that the rest of the pack has fallen silent, but she’s stuck on Bradley enfolded in Derek’s arms, shaking not with fear or sadness, but with that bone-deep anger. Derek has his arms wrapped around the boy like he can shield him from the world, just the two of them and their anger against everything.

Stiles is the first to move; two measured steps until he’s in front of Derek, Bradley between them, one hand on Derek’s shoulder and the other on Bradley’s. Like always, Stiles is the spark, and Allison feels grateful for his courage as she steps forward, huddling close and resting a hand on Bradley’s back. Then Scott is there, plastered against her back, tangling one hand with hers and resting the other on Stiles’ shoulder.

And that unthaws the rest of the pack, because suddenly Isaac and Cora are pressing against Derek’s back, and the three Kellys walk forward, and soon everyone is nudging close, even the children, who are lifted up onto hips or squirm until they can clutch handfuls of Scott’s and Derek’s jeans.

Finally, once everyone is crowded close, pressed warm and reassuring against at least two other people, they still, silent and respectful. This, this is Allison’s home: a little boy and his anger in the center, embraced and guarded by the pack spiraling around him. And this, this is the real kind of cleansing that Allison Argent does.

**Author's Note:**

> Livejournal post [here](http://ladylade.livejournal.com/22972.html).


End file.
